1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a thermal transfer recording apparatus and a facsimile apparatus for transferring ink from an ink sheet to a recording medium thereby recording an image thereon.
The above-mentioned thermal transfer recording apparatus can be employed in to the facsimile apparatus mentioned above, as well as an electronic typewriter, a copying apparatus, a printer or the like.
2. Related Background Art
In the following description, a thermal transfer printer will be explained as an example of the recording apparatus.
In a thermal transfer printer, image recording is generally achieved by employing an ink sheet consisting of heat fusible ink (or heat sublimable ink) coated on a base film, and selectively heating the ink sheet with a thermal head according to image signals, thereby transferring fused (or sublimed ink) onto a recording sheet. In such a thermal transfer printer, the ink sheet and the recording sheet are in kept mutual contact in the vicinity of a recording position by said thermal head, with an increased adhesive force particularly in areas heated by the thermal head.
Consequently, the ink sheet may be conveyed together with the recording sheet when it is necessary to advance the recording sheet only while it is desirable to stop the ink sheet, for example in the recording of a line of white image data, or in case of skipping a white area (area of no image recording). Such transportation of ink sheet can be prevented to a certain extent in an apparatus equipped with a mechanism for separating the thermal head from the platen to thereby eliminate the contact between the recording sheet and the ink sheet in case of transportation of the recording sheet alone. However, in a printer lacking this mechanism for separating the thermal head from the platen, such as a full-line thermal transfer printer, the ink sheet may be transported together with the recording sheet.
Also since the ink sheet adheres to the recording sheet because of ink transfer to the recording sheet by the heating of the ink sheet, the adhesion of the ink sheet and the recording sheet is not avoided by elimination of the pressure thereon, so that the combined movement of the two cannot be avoided.